


Lights out

by taztaas (manala)



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-31
Updated: 2018-01-31
Packaged: 2019-03-12 00:41:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13536018
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/manala/pseuds/taztaas
Summary: Something raps against the window and Kravitz jolts awake, a music sheet sticking to his face. He has fallen asleep at his desk again. Sitting up, he rubs at his tired eyes, half-wondering what woke him up.Prompt #50 “It’s not safe here.”





	Lights out

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on my tumblr [taztaas](http://taztaas.tumblr.com), prompted by anonymous who asked for my favorite AU

Something raps against the window and Kravitz jolts awake, a music sheet sticking to his face. He has fallen asleep at his desk again. Sitting up, he rubs at his tired eyes, half-wondering what woke him up. Something hits his window again, a small stone it sounds like.

Not really thinking about it he stands up, walks up to his window and opens it. He peers into the darkness below and spots something humanoid-shaped crouching down on the gravel, bending down to pick up more stones.

“Hello?” Kravitz calls out unsurely because he’s now awake enough to realize that he really isn’t friends with anyone who would be out on the school premises after dark, throwing things at his window.

The shape below stands up and Kravitz’s heart stops for a second because the person looks like Taako and he’s been gathering the courage to ask the elf out for _ages._

“Oh shit! Skellington?!” Lup laughs - because of course it had to be Lup - too loud and it makes Kravitz cringe in nervousness. “What are you doing in my brother’s room with your clothes on?!” She yells, trying to keep somewhat quiet at the same time but failing miserably, which seems to be a running theme with the twins.

Kravitz sighs. He goes to one campus Halloween party after watching _Fantasy The Nightmare Before Christmas_ and Lup hasn’t let it go since. He ignores the nickname and ignores _the other thing_ Lup said even harder because _what._

“This is my room, Taako’s is on the other side.” Kravitz whisper-shouts, “What are you doing here? It’s after curfew, you shouldn’t be out here, it’s not safe.” And it really is risky, Neverwinter High is extremely tight-assed about their rules. Breaking those rules - and getting caught - equals many grueling and boring hours in the school’s equivalent of community service.

“Pshaw, who gives a shit!” Lup says with a grin and a dismissive wave of her hand. Now that Kravitz’s eyes have gotten accustomed to the darkness, he notices that she’s wearing a red robe over her PJ’s and a pair of bunny slippers which seem a bit of an inconvenient choice in footwear for a night outside. “Get Taako for me?”

“Why don’t you just go around the building?” Kravitz asks with a frown but Lup just scoffs and shakes her head at him, as if exasperated by Kravitz’s ludicrous suggestion.

“And go through all that trouble when you can just walk a few steps across the hall to get him? Fuck that! Go get that boy for me.”

Kravitz pinches the bridge of his nose. He doesn’t know either of the twins that well but he’s familiar enough with their reputation that he knows it’s useless to argue.

“Fine. Wait just a moment.”

Lup grins and gives him a double thumbs up, her ears perking up excitedly. Kravitz closes the window just in case, not trusting Lup’s ability to control her impulses. He doesn’t want to come back to his room to find it full of gravel.

Resigned to his fate, he leaves his room and walks across the hall to Taako’s door. It takes a couple of knocks but then the door opens, revealing Taako in all of his drowsy glory. His hair is a tangled mess falling over his shoulders. He’s wearing a too large, worn t-shirt that is almost falling off one shoulder and a pair of sleeping shorts that are really way too short to be decent.

Kravitz is used to seeing Taako in carefully put together and thought-out looks, so seeing him like this makes something twist in Kravitz’s stomach and he bites his lip. Taako looks adorable. Thankfully Taako seems to be too out of it to take notice of Kravitz’s ogling.

“Muh?” The elf says intelligently, rubbing at one of his half-lidded eyes, ears drooping, his other hand still on the door.

“Oh, uh. Your uh- sister is asking for you.” Kravitz stammers out and Taako blinks in response but doesn’t look any more awake for it. He leans forward from the doorway and looks out into the hall, looking both ways. Besides the two of them, the hall is empty.

“Mrp?” He huffs out and looks at Kravitz with suspicion. His ears twitch in agitation.

“She’s ahh, she’s out on the courtyard, below my window,” Kravitz explains and points his thumb behind him, over his shoulder, indicating his dorm room. Taako’s eyes, glowing slightly in the dark, follow the movement.

“Meh.” Taako concludes and reaches for Kravitz’s hand, grabbing it before Kravitz has any time to panic about his clammy palms. Taako pulls his door closed with his free hand. Kravitz stares down at their joined hands in confusion before looking up.

“Uh, Taako? It’s just over there? You can actually see my door…”

“Mmm.” Taako says, staring Kravitz in the eyes blankly.

“You… You want me to walk you?”

“Mmm.” Taako keeps staring but his ears rise up slightly.

“Uh, okay I guess,” Kravitz says unsurely, but screaming internally - he’s holding Taako’s hand!! and pulls Taako with him to his room which is an uncharacteristic mess of bard-class assignments and reaper homework, double-majoring overwhelms him sometimes and work piles up.

Kravitz leads Taako to the window and lets go of his hand with no small amount of reluctance. Taako stands still, staring dumbly at the window, unable to comprehend the mechanism of opening it in his sleepy state. Kravitz sighs and reaches past him to open the latch and push the window open. His arm brushes Taako’s in the process and his skin breaks out in goosebumps.

Taako leans out of the window, just a bit too far to be safe and Kravitz is unable to stop himself from grabbing the back of Taako’s shirt to keep him from falling, just in case, even though he knows Taako has magic powers. Taako doesn’t seem to even notice but his other ear turns back towards Kravitz for a moment, like it has a mind of its own.

“There he is!” Lup yells from down below and Kravitz can’t help but to twitch in anxiety. They are so getting caught and raking leaves around the campus for the next month.

“Lulu?” Taako mutters, his first actual word of the night as he squints into the darkness where Lup’s eyes glow like a couple of lightning bugs.

“Get down here bro, we’re getting my fifteen dollars back!”

“You want to go rob Greg fuckin’ Grimaldis on a Wednesday night?” Taako asks before he yawns widely, his ears pressing flat against his head.

“Uhh, yeah?” Lup says, her tone indicating that it should be obvious.

“…Okay.”

Taako starts to clamber out of the window and Kravitz’s jaw drops open because he’s going outside in those shorts? Taako doesn’t even have shoes on, just fuzzy socks.

“See you later, handsome,” Taako says with a tired but charming grin and Kravitz smiles back hesitantly.

Taako jumps down, casting featherfall at the last possible moment to be as over the top as possible. He lands softly on the grass, striking a pose and discreetly pulling the hem of his shorts down a bit while he yawns widely once again.

“Show off,” Lup snorts with affection and then they’re off.

Kravitz closes his window, hardly believing what just happened. He turns off the lights and goes to bed, still feeling dazed.

He is woken by a tapping at his window, and he curses himself for being such a light sleeper. Kravitz tries to will himself back to sleep but the tapping continues. He tries hard to ignore it until he hears the sound of his very much locked window opening and he scrambles up in alarm, gets tangled in his blankets and falls to the floor with a soft thump.

From his new perspective, he sees Taako stepping into his room through the window. The elf seems even more sluggish than before. He must’ve run out of energy after managing whatever mischief he and Lup had been up to.

“Hey,” Kravitz says quietly, trying to sound casual despite laying on his floor after getting tentacled by his own bed covers.

“Mmh. ‘s cold,” Taako mutters and shuffles, zombie-like, to Kravitz’s bed and gracelessly flops down onto it. Kravitz fights his way out of the blankets and gets up to his knees to peer at the elf sprawled across his bed.

“Uh, Taako?”

He gets an unintelligible mumble, muffled by the mattress, in response.

“Are you… Are you gonna go back to your room?” Kravitz asks, standing up, holding his blankets in one hand.

“Nnn.” Taako whines. He doesn’t get up, but at least he rolls over slightly to make some space for Kravitz _in his own bed._

“Okay. Okay, I guess this is happening.” Kravitz says under his breath and throws one of the blankets on top of Taako who makes a pleased little noise and burrows under it.

Kravitz settles down next to him, being extremely conscious of their proximity and taking extreme care not to brush against the Taako-shaped lump under the covers.

He lays there, stiff as a board, eyes closed and breathing manually but eventually, he manages to fall asleep.

Until he wakes up again, for the _third_ time. Unsure what woke him up, he opens his eyes and finds himself laying on his side, face-to-face with Taako who is wide awake and whose face blooms intense red as Kravitz catches his eye.

He’s really close and Kravitz feels his own cheeks heating up. Taako’s breath hitches and they stare at each other with wide eyes.

Kravitz clears his throat, and whispers, “Hey.”

“Hey.” Taako breathes. “Sorry I crashed on your bed.”

“‘s okay,” Kravitz mumbles, blinking heavily because he has had about a wink of sleep and he still needs to get up early. He can’t remember the last time he was this tired. “You can stay if you want.” Kravitz’s eyes fall shut.

There’s a beat of silence, before Taako says, “For realsies?” And Kravitz smiles, already half asleep. “For realsies.”

**Author's Note:**

> [interstellarvagabond](http://interstellarvagabond.tumblr.com) wrote a continuation for this on her tumblr [here](http://interstellarvagabond.tumblr.com/post/170390660729/50-taakitz-maybe-with-your-favorite-au)


End file.
